President Kovind to visit Myanmar

New Delhi, Dec 4 President Ram Nath Kovind will pay a five-day visit to Myanmar from December 10 where he will interact with his Myanmar counterpart U Win Myint and State Counsellor Aung San Suu Kyi, it was announced on Tuesday.

“Through this visit, the President will reaffirm India’s commitment to developing its important partnership with Myanmar,” the External Affairs Ministry said in a statement.

“This is a country where India’s Act East and Neighbourhood First policies intersect; it is also the only Asean (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) member state that is both a land and maritime neighbour of India,” it stated.

India has been increasing its engagements with Southeast Asia under New Delhi’s Act East Policy.

India is also a key development aid partner of Myanmar and is working on some major infrastructure projects in that country, including the India-Myanmar-Thailand trilateral highway and the Kaladan multimodal transport project connecting Sittwe port with Mizoram.

“In the past three years, political, economic and defence ties with Myanmar have grown rapidly,” the Ministry statement said.

It stated that Kovind’s visit was expected to maintain the momentum generated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Myanmar in September 2017 and the visit of Suu Kyi to New Delhi in January 2018 for the India-Asean Commemorative Summit.

A joint statement will be issued during the visit and several agreements will be signed.